No fitness, silicone is not a cancer agent. It is an implantable polymer, used for decades now for coating implantable devices. It can be used in pacemakers, artificial heart pumps, automatic drug infusion pumps, catheters and other items. There has been a search for materials that are low risk and compatible with the human body. Certain forms of silicone fall into that category. The medical industry has to have materials which can be used for these things. If you oppose all forms of medical implants you are simply a Luddite. You need to get with the century.

Fanta, you didn't read it either did you? There is a difference.

I'm really starting to get the idea that some of you simply find articles that you think support your position and post them here without even bothering to read them all the way through, as if you want the others in this forum to do your homework for you.

Word for word, exactly what fitness clipped and pasted, except this time read and evaluated for content and used to support the opposite position.

Kerry, I think you are right that there may be better alternatives than having an implant. Personally I think implants should only be used with necessary. However some people may be unable to hang on to a wallet, or not trust themselves to do so. I think it comes down to an individual choice. If Uncle Sam starts requiring everyone to have an RFID implant I'm going to be very much against it, as will most Americans.

Nope, and I appreciate off the wall stuff, so I'll suggest one for you. Go see Bubba Ho-tep. You can find out once and for all what happened to JFK.

No, the answer is no. Aren't you reading the material you posted.

The article refers to silica as a risk, not silicone.

Read carefully now.

I'm going to repeat for you,,,

Silica is silicon dioxide (SiO2), found in sand and quartz.

Silicone is a synthetic polymer, a repeating chain of Si-O molecules, with various organic groups attached to the silicon

Silicon is the chemical element, always found in nature in combination with other atoms making up molecules

So silicone is not made from silica, it is made from silicon.

Research implantable silicone for more information.

I expect that any cancer issues related to the RFID devices are more likely related to the chemical composition of the materials coating the devices than to any EMI/RFI waves from the devices. And I expect that has been carefully managed as well. So I discount this report on this basis.

However, anytime you introduce things into the body there are opportunities for contaminates as well.

Many electronic devices are created on an epoxy resin base material. If this sort of material were exposed to the human body I would consider that risky.

Silica is silicon dioxide (SiO2), commonly found in sand and quartz.
Silicone is a synthetic polymer, or macro-molecule, whose backbone is a repeating chain of Si-O molecules, with various organic groups attached to the silicon
Silicon is the chemical element, always found in nature in combination with other atoms making up molecules

Certain forms Silicone have long been accepted as implantable compounds. There is an extensive process for approval and there has been a long history of use. Silicone breast implants were long considered safe, then considered unsafe, then considered safe again. If you want some silicone implant breasts you can get them now, so don't despair.

Ok just kidding.

There is a long history of silicone usage, however many still prefer certain forms of polyurethane. These also must undergo significant testing before approval.

I have heard that silica has been considered a cancer risk in some cases, however, silicone is not made from silica, silicone and silica are different compounds containing silicon as a fundamental building block.

watch out for flying saucers

RFID devices are passive. The do not emit an endless stream of RF waves. The only time they emit any waves at all are when in the presence of a RFID reader device.

The RFID chip gets its power from the receiver. When the receiver generates the proper carrier wave the RFID device uses that signal, like a little tiny transformer to generate the power for the RFID device to respond. So basically the device is benign from an electrical stand point except for perhaps some immeasurable .0001% of the time or such. Then when they do transmit, the response is a tiny mirror of a huge original signal. The amount of power into the device is hugely greater than the power out. Therefore if the signal is dangerous then anyone in presence of the device designed to read the RFID would get an enormously greater risk than the person actually carrying the device beneath their skin.

Now if the RFID device were encapsulated in toxic material, there may be some risk from the encapsulation material. Presently the FDA closely regulates what sorts of materials can be implanted within the human body. There are certain materials which are accepted as being low risk (non-toxic) Some examples are certain forms of silicone, certain forms of polyurethane, titanium and teflon.

I think you are chasing a red herring here. I'm asking the questions "Why?" and "If someone is stirring up this question, what are they diverting attention from?"

I absolutely guarantee that one minute with your cell phone is many times the output of an RFID device even when compared to the RFID device over a very extended period of time..

Fanta you missed the point here. I was talking about lobbyists writing legislation for the congress. Lobby money was never mentioned.

People line up to disavow lobby money, yet many of them take it anyway. Don't try to put it off on Republicans either, that is no reflection of reality and I'm not interested in a party line commentary here.

As for my position on lobbyists, I didn't mention that much either, but since you asked... I know a few people who visit politicians in Washington. I'm not sure they are your typical lobbyists, carrying sacks of money to be hidden in freezers, but congressmen occasionally give them a few minutes to speak with them on matters of interest.

These people, if they are fortunate may have the opportunity to discuss a few issues with the politicians from time to time. Most likely they are able to bring up a topic, get the congressman's position and give their own and a few reasons for their position.

These sorts of activities give politicians the opportunity to hear the public's views on matters which affect the public. Outside of that channel are the polls, the letters, and the media, none of which can advance a complete concept as well as a few well chosen words spoken by someone of respectable character.

Fanta, your response were mostly clippings of articles. I thought they were well written thoroughly digested streams to the media, but they were hardly your own comments on the matter I brought up, nor for that matter comments by others about the topic at hand, so please, let's try to keep it on topic. I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on the matter, but spare me the campaign rhetoric. I seldom believe any of that is sincere and it is only designed to swing support from one candidate to the person making the comments. There is no meat and potatoes at the end of the day, just window dressing.

Lobbyists are always going to be around. Telling the people they can not hire representatives to go speak to congressmen for them would be a little like limiting free speech, whatever you say.

However, letting them write the laws does not have to continue.

I think getting congress to act on this matter is unlikely because the alternative to having the lobbyists write the bills is for the lawmakers themselves to write them, which would be an enormous amount of work. Another reason they would not act on this matter is they would hardly like to call attention to their misfeasance along these lines for so many years.

So much for temptation.

I'm going to make my own CD now.

I have rock formations in my baggy of crack. They won't hold up underwater though. If you want to go rock formation exploring just let me know.

Good beans to use are the ranch style beans in a black can. They have a chili flavor already and they add to the taste nicely. Easy and cheap. You can choose pinto or red beans but the most common are pintos, and they are my favorite anyway.

I might add another onion and double garlic, but then I might regret it. That is always a tough call.

Never adder the cream of mushroom to chili, sounds interesting, might give that a shot.

Didn't see any jalapeños. I usually leave out the seeds. Didn't see any green peppers either. I would use one in this size recipe probably. Yikes to the habanero peppers.

Overall looks like a good recipe and since I have tried a couple dozen ways to make chili, I might give this one a shot too. always looking for ways to make new chili.

I tried adding yams once. They just taste like chili anyway, pointless from a flavor standpoint.

Did you know that chili peppers may be 5 or 10 times as hot as jalapeños?

I'm getting hungry now.

I have heard it said several times that lobbyists promoting certain agendas have gone so far as to write an entire bill for a congressman or senator, and that some of the most important bills fall into this category.

The amount of work this requires is enormous in some cases. There may be hundreds of pages in a single bill. A congressman may have no possibility of writing such a bill. The time involved may be simply too extensive. They may have the ability to read the proposed bill and edit certain matters, but even reading hundreds of complex writing can be tedious or impossible given the demands on a congressman's schedule. (I'm trying not to digress too much by mentioning the time consuming affairs with pages and complications of hiding secret funds in the freezer, but still to keep them in mind.)

Even if a congressman is diligent and reads and edits the lobbyist's work, he might not notice specific, peculiarly worded phrases which are both unhealthy for the country and unfairly benefit the companies which fund the lobbyist.

In the end, the work performed by the lobbyist is not scrutinized appropriately. Instead the bill is promoted on a partisan basis and promoted or squashed primarily on the basis of right or left wing ideology. Media campaigns contribute to the end result because congress is a media driven organization after all. Since the media can be bought by the same firms that promote the special interest bills, there is a good chance of getting bills past if they conform to some collection of partisan nature or perhaps moral high ground, for the greater good.

I suspect that complexity in the bills goes to the benefit of the lobbying companies. The more complex a bill, the less likely that flaws in the structure will be identified and repaired, and the less likely a congressman will scrap the whole thing and start over.

For these reasons I suggest that it might make sense for a policy shift or even a new law to limit or even prohibit a lobbyist or a company engaged in lobby activity from authoring bills for congress or the senate.

I definitely want a copy of the recipe. I'm going to move to recipe zone to see if I can find it there.

One trouble with the one term policy is that the new senators and congressman do not really learn the ropes early in the game. Near the end of their first terms they are just becoming well aware of the legislation in the system, and they have no extensive knowledge of the previous term's legislative efforts or successes. They also do not know about the compromises that were made to get certain laws enacted. This means that somebody has to be there to shepherd bills along the path and to keep a continuity of effort focused on important local and national issues.

For this reason first-term legislators usually do not have the leadership positions in committees, and they struggle and vie for positions on committees that interest them in particular.

If you take a libertarian view that no legislation is good legislation then the single term issue may be for you, but for those of us who want congress and the senate to make sensible choices, we need to have some experience in the house and senate.

I think there might be some procedural changes that could help. Consider for a moment that when the Democrats took over control of congress, the first thing they did was declare that in the first 100 hours or some such period, they were going to get some certain number of bills through. I think the approach was greatly flawed.

Probably it would have been better to say, in the first 100 hours we are not going to try to pass any bills but we will spend the entire time discussing which of our bills are worth the trouble and which are special interest lobby matters and should be wholesale scrapped. Then begin the process of prioritizing matters and trying to reach some consensus of which way to go.

It is not always reasonable to promote the hot button partisan issues even though your party has the iron fist control of majority leader. It is more reasonable to make value judgments and intelligent choices, then after evaluation, if the hot button partisan issues still hold water, go ahead, but take care to control lobbyist influence in the writing of bills, lest the single-interest group gain all the benefit from the bill.

Knox I agree with you about the extreme left and right, and about the politicians trying to enrich themselves. I do not agree they are laughing at us about it because I doubt they realize the harm they are doing. So long as they thing they are doing so well for us, why would they be laughing at us about it?

Hey I want a copy of that recipe with the Ecuadorian potatoes and peanut sauce.

Good observation Bl8ant. That should make him a shoe-in for the presidential palace. People love frogs all over the world.

Frog power for president!

Vote for me, I'll set you free!!!

Nice haircut Gypsy, and jeepers creepers, where'd you get those peepers? If you didn't look like such a horny devil with such big teeth...

Good morning.